Week Four

What now?

What time is it? Well the time is now! The present is all we can act in. The Kingdom is closer than we know. With The Holy Spirit’s help we can be citizens of this Kingdom right here and right now. And all it takes is God’s grace and our acceptance of who we truly are in him.

SEEDS TO SOW: Looking at your local community and your neighbourhood — what is it time for?!

Read Philippians 3: 17-21

Our citizenship is in heaven!

What does it actually mean to be ‘a citizen of heaven’ in the here and now? How does it impact our behaviour and the decisions we make?

Read Ephesians 2: 11-14

A Kingdom that transcends brders and divisions

God’s Kingdom, God’s reign, is not ‘might is right’ and defending my patch of soil against yours.

What borders can you see the Kingdom transcending in the world today?

How does this passage offer hope to areas in urgent need of reconciliation?

Read Matthew 19:16-30

With God all things are possible

We cannot buy our way into the Kingdom, or make it arrive on our terms, or to our schedule. What we can do is simply love one another with hearts of compassion and have a childlike openness to the ongoing arrival times of the Kingdom.

Why not finish this time together by praying for each other as you seek to live as citizens with compassionate childlike hearts? Pray for those whom you long to be open to the news of God’s Kingdom. Pray for God’s Kingdom to transcend any boundaries you have drawn up in your hearts.

After praying, take time to reflect as to whether God has been using this theme to encourage you as a group to act on some of those urgent local needs you identified in ‘Seeds to Sow’...what are you going to do together with His help?